


Sight for Sight

by Ironpen



Series: My Discord inspired One Shots [3]
Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Faerghus's dirty secret they keep from the church, Female My Unit | Byleth, Former Eldritch Bylad, Gen, Granny Areadbhar AU, Male My Unit | Byleth, Multi, Oneshot, Seer!Bylad, Spoilers for Twin Cult AU, TWSITD done fucked up, twins au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-02
Updated: 2019-12-02
Packaged: 2021-03-03 14:27:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,186
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21647935
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ironpen/pseuds/Ironpen
Summary: On the day of his 19th birthday and having exhausted all other routes, Dimitri pays a heavy price for a reassurance that his love and friend are alive. He pays it not just for himself but for all his friends, that their fight is not in vain.
Relationships: ?/Bylad/?, Dimitri Alexandre Blaiddyd & Edelgard von Hresvelg & Claude von Riegan, Dimitri Alexandre Blaiddyd & Garreg Mach Students, Dimitri Alexandre Blaiddyd/My Unit | Byleth, My Unit | Byleth & My Unit | Byleth, Other mentioned - Relationship
Series: My Discord inspired One Shots [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1560607
Comments: 2
Kudos: 24
Collections: BBell's Discord Grave





	Sight for Sight

**Author's Note:**

  * For [MsBluebell](https://archiveofourown.org/users/MsBluebell/gifts), [SICProwl](https://archiveofourown.org/users/SICProwl/gifts).

> Spoilers for the Twin Cult AU on BBell's Discord. Nothing to pinpointy but it's still being written so it counts since this in taking place in the future.
> 
> Only context you need: The twins are believed to be gods by the Church of Seiros but the Lords smuggled them out only for them to get captured by TWSITD during the 5 year timeskip but don't worry! A happy ending is assured. This is but a glimpse into the epicness that is unfolding in the Discord.

The Solstice. Finally. For nine months Dimitri had been trying every scrying method he could think of and he was reasonably sure would work for him to try and locate the twins, locate Byleth. He was far from the only one though they too showing nothing. But they were not Blaiddyd which means they did not have this one last ritual to try. 

For nine months since the spring equinox when the idea came to him he'd been gathering everything discreetly if all else failed. His numerous attempts had gained more and more pitiful looks with every new try and failure. Even Annette had looked at him such, when he'd exhausted the ancestral means and asked if the Dominic's had anything different.

At six months he'd cracked and on the autumn equinox had begged Areadbhar for any aid on the last resort. She'd been reluctant, he knew, still she offered him the last thing he needed to know for this to work. No matter what he saw he would see _something_.

His family was unsuited for it compared to others like the Fraldarius or the Reigan but there was one type of magic they_ were_ strong in. And so on this day, the winter solstice and the day of his birth he prepared his sacrifice. It was the dead of night, dawn far off in winter with only the faint glow of his lantern to see by. He made his way deeper into the crypt, the bag of his sacrifices was heavy on his back and the large black goat squirmed under his arm, quietly pleating.

The family crypts were a mystery to nearly everyone, only a handful of people alive knew anything that was down here and even then their scope would be limited. His father had only shown him this particular place once, deep into the rock. It was a ritual room though most rituals completed here were for more simpler things. A blizzard had blown through days ago but the sky was clear yet. The moonlight reflected down the narrow shafts by mirrors, bright enough to see the only altar in the room. He had to be quick, the third hour was approaching. 

First he secured the goat before beginning the rest of the preparation. The altar was large, enough to lay all the offerings down in reach for the rest. The salt and wood ash were natural components but the rest...nine items that would tie the bond from him to her. A fang from Lion, fallen out as he grew, the first since she was taken. An opal from Bylad's mask that Hilda had had made for him, light sparkled off it, all the color of an aurora he’d spoken of when Dimitri had been more naive. The old copy she'd given him of her favorite book that her cousin had turned out to have written, spine worn from repeated reading. Leaves of her favorite tea, those stolen moments at the monastery where they were hiding from her mother, giggling like children over their teacups. A wreath he'd painstakingly made of forget-me-nots. the flower that bloomed so easily around her as if she was the sun itself. A wooden charm he'd seen Jeralt carve before he'd gone off a faint lead, the lost father they hadn't had near enough time with. The egg shells from his new, still unnamed, gryphon partner like his ancestor Blaiddyd had ridden, he'd taken as a sign of fortune that they'd found the egg given this magic was from the blood. Second to last...a brooch his father had given his mother that had passed to him, one of the last possessions he had of the good man that had raised him and not the howling ghost that dogged his steps.

He breathed in the burning incense and ash and salt, sacrifice was required, he would get nothing without offering something in return, something important because he was asking for the one he cared for most. He pulled the time piece out and checked it, two minutes to Three. He placed a heavy hand on the goat to keep it in place as he lifted the ritual knife and positioned it, he would spare it the pain with a quick snap but he couldn't, not for this. His lips formed the first words of the chant, the prayer, the spell. He pushed and dragged, let blood spill forth down the slight slope to fill the bowl, entrails flopped out and laid in patterns he would read later. The goat should be crying out but all he heard was the silence of the graves. One by one he let the items fall into the bowl, swallowed by the dark blood as the magic on the altar dragged every drop out. Areadbhar sat heavy across his back as he pulled the dagger he'd once given to El, something she'd gifted him back with that promise to change their future together. He leaned over the bowl seeing the faint outline of his bedraggled form before he lifted the dagger to his eye and gave his last sacrifice. Sight for Sight. It plopped into the water, the only sound he'd heard so far. He gripped the stone as he rode through the pain, accepting it as his price as the he continued chanting deaf to his own voice. The blood dripped off the dagger into the bowl, sending somehow darker ripples through it.

The air was oppressively heavy, over a thousand years of necromancer blood laying in these halls being called forth for something on the line of it and other magics. It was the grim hour on the darkest day when such magic would be at its strongest. The significance of his birth falling on this day would only help him, especially on his nineteenth birthday. He could have waited another year for three years of loss but the weight would be the same and he could not bare to lose another year without knowing. The dark reflection wavered like the ripples on the pond as the next drop bloomed into a reptilian pupil. 

Fire ignited in his veins, a lance through his fallen eye and into his bone, his mind. A scream did not fall from his lips, his throat closing tight over it. He reeled, dagger falling soundlessly from his hand as he dropped to the ground. A red film crossed his sight, then black....then green. A pale green wavering light like an aurora was cloaked the world as he stood in a place no longer where he'd been. The pain had shifted, his eye was still on fire but it now felt as if he was moving with a thousand pounds weighing him down. He could see nothing else yet soon the silence was broken. A murmur, barely audible but coming right in front of him. Dimitri trudged forward, each step a struggle but dark halls formed around him more and more with every one. The murmur grew in low chatter, still inaudible. A cell appeared along the wall on his right. He stopped in front of it, the chatter growing into shouting, so many voices he could still not make out voices but the sight within snatched all his attention. 

Byleth was curled up in the cell, staring sorrowfully at the wall beyond the cell, occasionally she'd shiver or flinch but she seemed relatively alright. Dirty and her clothes were fraying but there were no obvious wounds and she didn't seem starved though her cheeks were slightly sunken. She was pale though and she had bags under her dull eyes, a plate of untouched food, bland but edible was laid untouched at her side. He looked around at the rest of her cell, no room. The floor was bare wood with no rugs and a simple bed, table and chair so the cell bars must be part of the vision, representing her captivity. He wavered, his legs almost going out from under him in relief at her continued life, a rising cheer from further ahead kept his legs locked in place. He was reluctant to leave her there but this was a vision and one on a time limit at that. He kept going forward, his senses going weightless as the vision began to end so he pushed himself to go faster.

The end came when he entered into a large cavern, it had to be a cavern since he could see no windows, lit only by large braziers and spelled crystals. A veritable sea of robed figures stood before him in the massive hall, each and every back adorned with some kind of symbol he had never seen before. The shouting cleared, thousand of voices chanting. His eyes were drawn forward to what they were worshipping, darkness gathering at the edges of his sight, and he gasped. His eyes met the piercing green of Bylad's whos eyes only paused a moment before flicking to his sacrifice and it burned anew, spreading out across the whole right side of his face. His sight tunneled instantly, details dissolving instantly, chanting silenced, until he just caught one last glimpse of Bylad's exhausted face before he was gasping awake on the chamber floor.

It seemed to be forever before he caught his breath and another eternity before he could start lifting himself off the ground. It was slow going, he felt a bone-deep exhaustion that came from intense magic and all his limbs felt half-numb from laying on the cold stone. The moonlight had given way to sunny gold which told him it had indeed been hours. He had to leverage himself to his feet by hanging onto the altar but thankfully his feet stayed steady. As he squinted down he felt dried blood unpleasantly crack on his blind side, he didn't bother wiping it off. His vision was wavering a little too much to read the entrails but given the shriveled state he'd get nothing out of it, that was fine, he'd gotten exactly what he'd wanted.

The blood was gone of course, as were all the things he'd offered except for one thing. If it was left behind....

He reached in and plucked out the eye shaped gem. It was pristine and the same bright blue as his eye, veined with more shades of blue just like an eye would naturally be except for the black reptilian shaped pupil that gazed up at him. If he felt any emotion from it, he couldn't tell, was it the exhaustion or simply because it was made from him? He couldn't recall the tales of similar things though he knew there were. He gave up quickly and clutched it close as he made his way out of the crypts. He'd have to clean everything up later, leaving it wouldn't result in any more of a mess. For it being mid-morning the halls were disturbingly empty, even for a feast day. 

His feet carried him not to his room but to the Great Feasting Hall. The quiet giving way to a distant shouting, the great doors cracked open enough for him to slip in. Hundreds of people were crowded in, grouping together as they frantically talked. his classmates were grouped in the center and Annette in particular was sat flat on the ground as she thumbed through books in a frenzy, tossing them aside if whatever she was looking for was not found within. Surprisingly it was Caspar who looked over in his direction first. His eyes turned into dinner plates as he rushed over, his armor clanking dully drawing everyone else's attention.

"DIMITRI!" Caspar shouted because he was always loud but it sounded watery as if he was hearing him from underwater. Horror was painted on all their faces though they didn't look him in the eye but at his blinded eye. They all drew close, Caspar holding his arm like he expected him to drop, which was fair because he probably was. Good old Caspar, one of his beloved's first friends, so uncaring for what everyone declared holy and untouchable. As if his beloved did not hate being treated like a revered doll. Claude's eyes were the ones he caught, intense and green, darker and deeper then the aurora he'd seen in his vision. The only one actually looking at _him_. The gem was a cold weight in his hand as he lifted it to show him. All the shouting died they looked at it. 

"I did it, I saw them." He slurred as the last of his strength left him, collapsing unconscious into their arms. The strongest of them were ordered to bring him to his room for recovery. It would be hours yet before he woke and discovered it was not the sacrificed eye that had changed but that the socket of his right eye was now covered in small scales, a deep dark blue with a silvery iridescent sheen, so beautifully *strange*. He’d quickly come to wear an eyepatch just so others would pay attention to what he was saying rather than the scale.

**Author's Note:**

> In case you didn't know, the dirty secret is the Blaiddyd are very good necromancers and the art of it is still thriving in Faerghus hidden from the eyes of the Church.


End file.
